How to raise your rates as a freelance video creator.

Over the summer I met up with George over at Seed Creative to shoot some videos about what we have learned so far about being in the industry, how to service as a freelance artist, and in this video- how to raise your rates as a freelance Video creator.
The one real “trick” I’ve learned in this regard is:

Let me follow up with something I see all the time:
I meet people every day and they ask me- How do I get more clients. How do I make more money, faster.

And for me at least- thats two different things.
I USE to grind on 2 jobs a day. I would try to get as many clients as possible all the time. Get them in, get stuff shit, get it uploaded or out the door. And I wasn’t really making a lot, and I was tired all the time, and had no time to be with friends or my family.

And that’s when it hit me- I actually wanted LESS clients. But I wanted to do bigger work. This led to a couple things.

1. Those clients had more trust in me, and I had more trust in them.
I was there with them more, I was more focused on them and their needs.

2. I wasn’t trying to schedule my life in 1 hour increments. I wasn’t going crazy trying to focus on which project was which this week, what’s due today, tomorrow, YESTERDAY.

3. I got to give the project enough time. So many times in the past it was “I wish I had more time to do this project right but thats all I have budgeted”. By having higher value and less clients I was able to really develop an idea to completion.

I also want to say there is NOTHING wrong with getting a ton of clients, I mean look at mcdonalds- Billions served is crazy when you think about it. But there’s a methodology to the madness, and very little room for creativity or excellent execution.

Lets go 1 Step Further:
Imagine its a formal occasion and you want a nice Fancy dinner.
How long are you at that place? How is the food presented? How does it Taste? Its totally different than a gas station burrito.
The gas station burrito will still feed you, it will still taste great if you are starving. But if someone offered you the choice between a gas station frozen burrito for free, or a dinner for 2 at a 5 star restaurant for free- Which would you choose? Why? Chances are most of the time you’ll choose the restaurant.